


Severe In His Enjoyments

by starriestofgates



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Canon Era, Enjolras takes his fun very seriously, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Les Amis are good bros, keeping secrets (kinda)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-09
Updated: 2019-11-09
Packaged: 2021-01-26 07:02:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21370090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starriestofgates/pseuds/starriestofgates
Summary: Even the most devoted revolutionary has to indulge himself sometimes. Fortunately for Enjolras, he also has very understanding friends.
Comments: 12
Kudos: 28





	Severe In His Enjoyments

**Author's Note:**

> We don't really get to know anything about the things Enjolras does on his own time, so I decided to assign him An Enjoyment to Be Severe About.

Enjolras glanced at his pocket watch, trying to be unobtrusive. The late afternoon sun shot bars of gold across the side wall of the Musain’s back room, illuminating battered furniture and the various heads of its current occupants and users. Enjolras was deeply fond of those heads, but just now he rather wished them less inclined to linger. If some of the others took their leave now, he could do the same without its being remarked upon; he was almost never the first to leave a gathering of their brotherhood, and it would draw attention. But the hour was growing late; the time he had been waiting for all day was drawing near, and he could not afford to remain here much longer. In another few minutes he would _have_ to go, whether it drew attention or not. He devoutly hoped that someone else would as well.

“Are you feeling well?” Combeferre inquired of him solicitously. “Forgive me for saying so, but you seem a bit restive.” Enjolras generally appreciated his dear friend’s earnest attention to those around him, but this was not a particularly good time to have that observant eye trained on him.

“Perfectly well,” he replied, smiling in what he hoped was a casual and reassuring manner, revealing nothing of his inner agitation. “Merely—preoccupied.”

Combeferre nodded understandingly, but before he could speak again, Courfeyrac sat back from the table a few feet away where he had been engaged in a boisterous game of checkers with Bahorel. “I’m off,” he said cheerfully, “things to do, people to see, you know.” He rose to his feet and stretched, then yelped as Bahorel leaned across the table to poke him in the stomach, scattering checkers everywhere. A small scuffle began as Courfeyrac chased Bahorel around the table, trying to return the poke with interest, while Combeferre attempted to gather up the checkers before they were lost and swatted at the two roughhousers whenever they bumped into him. Most of the others in the room were watching the scene and laughing. Enjolras, seeing an opportunity to quietly depart while the rest were thus handily distracted, did so with as much haste as seemed conducive to stealth.

He checked his watch again as he hurried along. He was actually in good time, especially if he cut through a few back alleys. His knowledge of the city and its neighborhoods had been acquired for reasons other than the one which sent him racing out tonight, and he experienced a mild twinge of guilt thinking of it, but his rising excitement quieted the guilt for now.

Enjolras arrived at his destination a few minutes earlier than he had expected to; his shortcut had been even shorter than he had hoped. He took a moment to straighten his coat, then a brief conversation, a quick transaction, and he was inside. He selected a good vantage point, one from which he would have the best view he could while still remaining relatively difficult to spot from most other parts of the room. Settling himself in his seat, he took a deep breath and surveyed the program the ticket-man had handed him. Johann Sebastian Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos, performed at full length, it promised him. The orchestra was tuning up even now.

Enjolras had heard quite a number of the great composer’s works performed, as well as those of Handel, Pachelbel, Scarlatti, and others. He had never had a chance to hear these particular concertos, although he had wished almost desperately to do so for years. He was not given to indulging in the kinds of entertainment that his friends regularly enjoyed; he did not judge them for it, nor grudge them their fun, but for him, the great cause of Liberty must always take precedence over almost anything else. It seemed almost like cheating his beloved country of her rightful due, to take time away from seeking her good purely to amuse himself. Yet when it came to orchestral concerts, especially the beautiful, dramatic works of the Baroque masters, Enjolras found it impossible to resist. He could never hear such a concert announced, especially of pieces he had never yet heard (or ones of which he was particularly fond), without being seized with a desire to attend, whatever else might be going on.

In a situation where something truly significant was to do among the groups who gathered in secret to speak of democratic ideals and the rights of man, Enjolras knew, he would sacrifice his concert-going without even having to make a conscious choice to do so. He was secretly grateful that none of the concerts he had attended had ever coincided with anything important, and especially grateful today. The afternoon’s meeting had only been a routine one, so there had been no pressing reason for him to linger, but he still found himself hoping that no one had noticed him quitting the room so precipitously. He was not ashamed of his fondness for music, exactly, and he had certainly never allowed it to interfere with serious revolutionary business, but he had a few times cut a meeting short with an excuse and once rescheduled something non-urgent in order to make time for a particularly tempting performance. He had never let on about the real reason for those occasions, and he supposed it said something about his devotion to the revolutionary cause that none of his friends had ever questioned it.

Enjolras knew that they would likely not turn a hair should they discover his addiction to concerts; it was far less wild or indulgent than some of the things many of them got up to, and he did now and then attend theatrical performances with friends (especially Combeferre) when they seemed relevant to revolutionary interests. Nonetheless, his passion for orchestral music was a purely personal one, and consequently felt too much like a dereliction of duty for Enjolras to be altogether easy in his mind sometimes. It would, he thought, complicate matters too much should his friends find out about it. They would be too entertained to learn that he had something he actively pursued entirely outside of their mutual cause. They might make much of it. It would be embarrassing. He did not like to be the center of attention when the conversation was about personal matters, nor could he refrain from feeling as if he would be letting his loyal comrades down a bit if they knew that he (very rarely, he attempted to reassure himself) prioritized a certain degree of self-indulgence over spending his time working for the progress, the dream, they all shared.

The orchestra finished its tuning up, and its members positioned themselves purposefully. The audience, recognizing that their evening’s entertainment was about to begin, quieted down into a respectful silence, broken only by the occasional cough. Enjolras sat up straighter and bit his lips in a moment of pure, shining anticipation. He gripped the program tightly. It crumpled somewhat, but he scarcely noticed. Then the music began and he forgot everything else—the paper clutched in his hands, the thinness of the padding in his seat, and even, temporarily, the thought of revolution. The glorious burnished measures of the Concertos encircled him, wound around him like honey-golden ribbons. He drank them in as eagerly as cold water in July and found them more intoxicating than the finest champagne.

When the final notes had ended, the prolonged thunder of applause had ceased, and the audience was collecting its coats, reticules, candy-boxes, and other paraphernalia, and beginning to stream out of the doors into the night, Courfeyrac said to Bossuet, “Did you see the chief over there in the corner? That’s the fourth time I’ve seen him at a concert by himself. He always ducks out immediately after the final bows as if somebody was after him.”

“I didn’t notice him,” Bossuet answered lightly, “but it would be the second time he and I have been to the same concert separately, following which he quickly vanished like the gentle breeze.” He examined the floor around him for his hat, which appeared to have vacated the premises.

“Second for me, too,” Joly said, “although I think it must have been a different concert from you, the other time, Eagle. Oh, I think your hat’s gone under the seat here—” he attempted to fish it out with his cane, but only succeeded in pushing it further away.

“I wonder why he’s so secretive about it,” Courfeyrac mused, as Bossuet got down on all fours and groped blindly under the seat. “Do you think he’s embarrassed? I don’t see why he would be, it’s always been something lovely and respectable performed when I’ve seen him.”

“Perhaps he thinks it untoward to entertain himself so frivolously when there is serious work to be done in the world,” Bossuet suggested, finally succeeding in reclaiming his wayward headgear. It seemed that someone in the row in front of them had been rather sloppily drinking wine. Bossuet stood back up, regarding the rather damp hat with mild resignation. Joly handed him a handkerchief to mop it off with as they made their way towards the exit. “It’s not _that_ frivolous,” he said. “Anyway, it’s not as if Enjolras doesn’t deserve to entertain himself now and then. He hardly ever seems to do anything for his own personal amusement, unless you count spending time with all of us, and half the time it’s to do with you-know-what anyhow.”

“I _wish_ we could get him to relax and enjoy himself more often,” Courfeyrac sighed. “He lives and breathes Liberty and the Rights Of Man and all that, and of _course_ we’re all devoted to the cause body and soul as well, but for heaven’s sake, it doesn’t ruin that devotion to take an evening or so for one’s own happiness. One doesn’t love one’s mother less just because one also has a friend or two.” He had lagged behind the other two slightly to allow for easier passage through the narrow aisle; as they emerged into the cool of the evening, he draped an arm over each of their shoulders. “Do you think we ought to try and snag him the next time we see him at a concert, explain to him that he’s perfectly entitled to a little fun now and again?”

“No,” Joly said thoughtfully, “I think that he probably doesn’t want anyone to know that he goes to these performances. You’ll notice he never talks about concerts, or anything like that, only theater as a means of promoting progress if anything. The plays Combeferre manages to haul him to, you know, things like that.”

“Shall we keep his little secret, then,” Bossuet inquired, “shall we permit him his private indulgence, and only smile benevolently upon him from afar when he knows it not, on such occasions as we may witness it?”

“I suppose so,” Courfeyrac conceded. “And as long as we are talking about indulgences, the new perfume your hat has acquired is reminding me that I have a bottle or two at home, as well as a really excellent meat pie I’ve barely touched, and the night’s young yet. Care to keep the evening going?” Pleased by the others’ enthusiastic assent, he continued, “We should also swing by Marius’ place and carry him off to engage in revelry with us, whether he will or no. He studies constantly—it’s really quite shocking. He doesn’t get out half often enough and he’s getting a wilted look about him.” Privately he thought that Marius’ wilted look was partly caused by a chronic lack of sufficient to eat, and hoped to entice him to a goodly portion of the aforementioned meat pie, but he had no desire to embarrass his friend by bringing up his poverty in front of others, whether he was present or no. They went on their way, leaving a trail of laughter in their wake.

While Courfeyrac, Bossuet, and Joly were press-ganging a somewhat startled Marius, Enjolras was walking dreamily through the streets in the general direction of his own rooms. He was blissfully unaware that anyone he knew had been present at the concert, which he was replaying in his mind to his immense satisfaction. It had been a wonderful evening, he thought. His reverie was interrupted by the realization that he had forgotten to return Combeferre’s copy of Thomas Paine’s _Common Sense,_ which he had borrowed last week and had put into his coat pocket specifically that afternoon with intent to hand it back at the Musain. Well, Combeferre’s lodgings were not so very far away. Enjolras turned the corner and directed his steps thither.

“Enjolras!” Combeferre greeted him with pleasure. “Come in, won’t you? We were just thinking about dinner—would you care to join us?” Prouvaire, who was sitting cross-legged tailor style on the divan, added, “Yes, do.” Enjolras smiled at them, but explained that he had merely come to return the book. “I’ve too much work to do this evening, I’m afraid,” he said. “A lot of writing that should have been done earlier.”

“Oh, but surely it can wait until tomorrow,” Prouvaire protested.

“It’s up to you,” Combeferre said amiably, “if you feel you must spend the evening writing, of course you should do as you’re inclined, but it doesn’t hurt anything to take a night off just for enjoyment now and then. You know that, don’t you?”

“It’s all right,” Enjolras said. He took affectionate leave of them, promising Combeferre a full accounting of his thoughts on _Common Sense_ the next time they saw each other.

“He went to another concert, didn’t he?” Prouvaire said when Combeferre shut the door behind their departing friend. “He had that dazzled look on again.”

“There was a performance of the Brandenburg Concertos this evening,” Combeferre replied, “at that hall where we went to hear Vivaldi’s Four Seasons last winter.”

“Of course,” Prouvaire said happily, “of course there was.” He paused, then went on pensively, “He gives so much of himself to the coming revolution, and although of course it’s wonderful to have such a passion for anything that one flings one’s soul into it to such an overwhelming degree, there are so many things to love in the world. I’m glad he has something to enjoy all for himself.”

“So am I,” Combeferre agreed. He contemplated Prouvaire for a moment, warm and lively in the lamplight, and thought about Enjolras, and their shared dreams for the future, and of that concert last winter, and how Prouvaire’s face had looked during it, and he thought about all of the things there were to love in the world, and all the ways there were of loving them.

Enjolras contentedly wended his way home, where he proceeded to sit up until nearly three o’clock in the morning working on a pamphlet about the injustices of noble privilege. Now and again he paused and smiled happily into space, thinking about the splendor he had listened to that evening, before diving back into his project. No one on earth, he thought, could be enjoying his life more just now than I.

**Author's Note:**

> I have absolutely no idea which orchestral pieces were being commonly performed in Paris circa 1830; Enjolras likes the Baroque masters because I like the Baroque masters. Also, Thomas Paine was actually in France during the early 1790s (guy couldn’t get enough of revolutions, apparently), and his "Rights of Man" was written partially to defend the French revolution. He was popular with the Girondin political faction, with whom Combeferre is associated in-canon by explicit comparison to major Girondin figure the Marquis de Condorcet.


End file.
